Diving for cover at a base in Basra

IT WAS 12:30 and the cook room was beckoning when the siren went off on the "Royal Mile". As with everyone in the compound of the Scots Guards – where the narrow walkways named after Scottish landmarks are lined with head-high sandbags – all thoughts of lunch disappeared as we immediately dived to the ground.

As I crunched down into the gravel I scrambled to fix on the chin-strap of my hard helmet while checking that my protective body armour was in place. I lay prone, face down, surrounded by soldiers in their desert camouflage uniforms, waiting for the sound of impact.

Missile attacks – indirect fire or IDFs in the military jargon – are a constant reminder to the thousands of British troops contained on their base outside the southern Iraqi city of Basra that despite last month's hand-over of control to the Iraqi government they are still operating in a dangerous environment. Just a few miles away, in the city, dozens were dying as a Shia sect battled the Iraqi army, testing its ability to keep control without help from the British.

The threat to the UK base has receded to around three attacks a week, rather than the daily bombardments that had to be endured just a few weeks ago, but they are a threat nevertheless. Yesterday's high explosive rocket, fired from well outside the perimeter of the 20-kilometre long Contingency Operating Base (COB), landed harmlessly in a muddy patch of scrubby desert inside the British base.

Others have not been so benign, with a handful causing relatively minor injuries, but no fatalities since the hand-over in mid-December. Most have been ineffective stabs at the British presence, given the size of the base five kilometres from the outskirts of northern Basra. Even so, all of the 4,500 army personnel stationed on the base sleep on beds surrounded by low breeze-block walls and covered overhead with a heavy steel plate with sandbags piled on top. The theory is that even if the missile comes through the roof of the canvas tent the sleepers below will be protected. As one senior Scots Guard put it: "In your bed you should be in the safest place in Basra."

Caught out in the open, the drill after the warning siren is sounded is to dive to the floor and become intimately acquainted with the ground beneath. The incoming missiles are likely to have been picked up on radar and there will be attempts to shoot them down. If they get through then where they land is sheer luck.

You lie hugging the ground for three minutes. A missile or mortar shell landing close by will explode and send shrapnel flying at a 30-degree angle up into the air and safely overhead. Then you rise and rush to seek better cover. The alert remains in place until the all-clear sounds.

Yesterday's strike was a rare daytime attack. Most take place after dark when the local Iraqis who work on the base have gone home and the IDF teams of insurgents can operate on the base perimeter with less fear of detection from British patrols.

The Scots Guards, part of the 4th Mechanised Division, play a key role in protecting the base as they operate fleets of Warrior armoured vehicles. With their 30mm cannon and heavy machine guns, the Warriors are at present deployed around the base to protect the troops inside from incursions. But on Friday night, when violence broke out in Basra at the start of a religious festival, the Warriors with their seven-man crews were positioned at the gates in case a call for support came in from the Iraqi authorities.

For the first time since the December hand-over, around 250 Scottish troops from the Scots Guards and Edinburgh-based Royal Scots Borderers, were "stood up" for six hours, waiting for the call to action. Had the call come, they would have been led out of the COB by Challenger tanks, the "sponges" that will absorb small-arms fire and mortar attacks, with the Warriors in convoy behind.

Despite the violence, no call for assistance came and so the troops were eventually stood down and returned to barracks. For senior commanders, it was a clear sign of growing Iraqi confidence in the Shia-dominated city.

Lt Col Derek Plews, the base's senior media spokesman, said: "There was an outbreak of fighting involving a group called the Soldiers of Heaven, but what we saw was that the Iraqi police quickly getting a grip. They asked us to give them access to surveillance and for a show of force. We arranged for fast jet passes to take place."

Basra police chief Major General Abdul-Jalil Khalaf said at least 44 people were killed in Iraq's second-largest city – seven officers, two civilians and 35 gunmen – while dozens more were wounded and 100 gunmen were arrested.

For now, for the troops deployed in Britain's last outpost in Iraq, it's back to the routine of weapons testing, patrols and the training of Iraqi forces. The punctuation of the constant missile alerts is the reminder that they remain within a war-zone. Even as I prepared to press the button on my laptop to file these words, the warning siren sounded again. And, for the second time in a few hours, the dusty soil of this still troubled land became my closest friend.